I felt a frisson at the greater risk and danger. I wanted to experience more serious climbs, push my limits, flirt with that frisson.
The Scottish Highlands in winter was the next step. There I learned the techniques of snow and ice climbing, using crampons and ice axes, as well as survival skills such as snow holing, coping with bad weather and avalanche awareness. In winter the daylight hours are short in Scotland, which focuses the mind on early starts, on speed and efficiency in the hills and on being prepared for ‘benightment’ – getting caught out after dark. Often the weather can be grim, with gale-force wind, snow and thick cloud reducing visibility and increasing the risk of cold. Avalanches are a real threat in the Scottish Highlands and being able to navigate and survive in such severe conditions is an excellent apprenticeship for the Greater Ranges. Serious and committing mountaineering adventures can be experienced even on the relatively low Scottish mountains in winter. Conditions can be arctic and the hills should not be underestimated. Learning to cope with poor visibility, gale-force winds, blizzards and darkness on a 900–1000m Scottish mountain is excellent practice. Such early testing experiences – minor ‘epics’, as climbers call them – certainly stood me in good stead for what was to come. If the hill fog socked in on a Himalayan summit, as happened on Cho Oyo and Annapurna, or I ended up descending an 8000er after sunset, as on K2, Nanga Parbat and Kangchenjunga, I was not as anxious as I might have been; my mind had been conditioned, my resilience honed by such earlier mountain experiences in Britain. I still head out to battle blizzards on British hills; there is something satisfying and refreshing about tackling desperate winter weather, when hills that are easy under summer conditions become serious mountains.
To satisfy my desire for bigger hills, I progressed to the Alps, where I climbed classic big routes such as the Matterhorn, Mont Blanc and the North Face of the Eiger. In the Alps I first experienced the unpleasant effects of altitude and it slowed me down, but after a couple of weeks I found that my body acclimatised well and I could soon climb high Alpine routes at virtually full power.
Although I had climbed technically more difficult Alpine routes, the North Face of the Eiger − the Eigerwand − was the big prize for me. I had read so much about that famous, dangerous climb that I felt I was climbing a vertical mountain history book. It was like being on a giant tombstone, passing places where so many climbers had died. The whole experience on that historic north wall was exciting and pleasurable. I seemed able to keep my fear at bay and relish simply being there. I enjoyed the sustained technical mixed snow, ice and rock climbing and was neither particularly fazed nor scared by the fusillade of rocks and stones that whizzed and screeched down the face. These stones are melted out of the summit ice field when the sun reaches it in the late afternoon. Any one of them could have been as lethal as a bullet but it all just seemed part of the experience. Today I would flinch at the sound of each whining, falling rock. Satiating my desire to climb the Eigerwand was a release and the ascent was a rite of passage.
Climbing with Doug Scott on a 5000m peak in 1988. This is an acclimatisation climb above Advance Base Camp with Makalu West Face behind.
At the time I was working as a teacher and the long summer holiday allowed plenty of time for the ascent. Returning to school that autumn, I remember feeling very satisfied and somehow different from the other teachers who had probably been to the seaside. It was not a feeling of superiority, rather a growing understanding of what I wanted to do in life, a dawning realisation that my approach to life was different. My real ambition was to climb more mountains and not to be stuck in a classroom with only weekends and limited holidays in which to fulfil my passion.
In the mid-1980s I resigned from teaching, took up Himalayan climbing and qualified as a British Mountain Guide, an international accreditation coordinated by the International Federation of Mountain Guide Associations. I could now make my living in the mountains, especially the Alps. While Alpine mountaineering is more dangerous than British climbing – there are rock falls, avalanches, crevasses and dramatic electrical storms – I was not deterred; in fact, I wanted more.
Jerzy Kukuczka, the great Polish mountaineer, in Kathmandu,1987. Climbing Shisha Pangma, his final 8000m peak, made him the second person to complete all 14 after Reinhold Messner.
Camping at 8000m on the north side of K2, the exposed ‘Eagle’s Nest’ bivouac on a tiny rocky ledge below the final hanging glacier which leads to the summit. There is a 2500m drop to Base Camp.
By now, I felt that I had served my apprenticeship in the mountains. I was ready for the Greater Ranges. My first forays were to 5000m and 6000m mountains such as Mount Kenya by the Diamond Couloir, Kilimanjaro by the Heim Glacier, Denali (Mount McKinley), the Andes and many 6000m Himalayan peaks. Here I made several first ascents; I also had a few epics and experienced the effects of increasingly high altitudes on my body.
Climbing on the 8000m peaks felt like a natural progression. It just felt right. My initial attempts were on expeditions I had been invited to join – the first two were on Polish expeditions with the legendary 8000m climber Jerzy Kukuczka, Wanda Rutkiewicz and Krzysztof Wielicki, followed by expeditions with Doug Scott, Benoit Chamoux and other well-known Himalayan climbers – although I later organised my own expeditions.
How did I end up climbing 8000m peaks, on which death can come so easily? I had no plan or desire to climb all 14. It hardly seemed a realistic goal when only two people, Kukuczka and Reinhold Messner, had achieved it. I was simply interested in climbing 8000m mountains because I felt they were the ultimate test of resilience, stamina, skill and endurance.
Climbing ‘Alpine-style’ on Makalu at 7500m in a one-piece down suit and duvet jacket, in 1988. Lhotse 8516m, the South Col 7920m and Everest 8848m behind. Strapped to my rucksack is a yellow foam Karrimat to insulate me from the snow when bivvying. The ski poles are to help on easier-angled slopes, and to use as probes to check for hidden crevasses. Trekking poles were not common in 1988 and I set a precedent when I used old ski poles. Most people use purpose-made trekking poles now.
All of the 8000ers are in what is dubbed ‘the death zone’, an unforgiving environment in which your body starts to deteriorate to the point at which you actually start to die. It is not possible for a human being to survive for long beyond a couple of days above 8000m and there are no rescue teams or helicopters to rely on. A helicopter has an operational ceiling of 6500m. Simply surviving takes tremendous effort, both physically and mentally. All water, which you must drink to prevent dehydration and stay alive, is frozen as snow and ice and requires laborious effort melting it on a small stove. Breathing and movement are difficult and slow, sleep is virtually impossible and the cold, often 40 below, will freeze exposed flesh. Frostbite is a real possibility, often leading to the loss of frozen fingers, toes or even limbs.
The black frostbitten toes of a climber I rescued from K2. Subsequently these three toes were amputated.
Between 8000m peak expeditions I was usually in Britain, the Alps or climbing other 6000m and 7000m Himalayan peaks. Working as an International Mountain Guide meant that my world revolved around mountains. Climbing one 8000er, I realised, had been a privilege but I developed an urge to test myself on a few more.
My first sighting of K2 from Concordia in the Karakoram made a great impression on me. I knew that I had to climb that stark, dramatic steep-sided peak, known as the Savage Mountain. My quest for its summit extended over three expeditions; I dedicated,
